A Class with Drucker

The Lost Lessons of the World’s Greatest Management Teacher

Author: William A. Cohen
Pub Date: 2007
Your Price: $24.95
ISBN: 0814409199
Format: Hardcover

• Overview
• Author Bio
• Drucker Bio
• Peter Said, Bill Said
• Press Release
• Sample Chapter
• Table of Contents
• Request an Evaluation Copy, INSTRUCTOR ONLY!

A Class with Drucker

The Lost Lessons of the World’s Greatest Management Teacher

For all his distinctions and contributions, Peter Drucker was first and foremost a teacher. Teaching was really a partnership for Peter, and an almost sacred trust between teacher and students, where knowledge was not only disseminated but also created. The classroom, then, was really Peter's first and last frontier of management, the ultimate knowledge-creating organization, a microcosm and laboratory for so many of his insights about human capital, purpose, objectives, innovation, and so much more. Bill Cohen brings that laboratory of learning alive to those of us who didn't have the pleasure, privilege, or opportunity to sit at the feet of the master in Peter's classroom. One can feel the energy, the humor, the discipline, the interaction, the edge, the energy, the simplicity, and the relevance of Peter's practice of teaching." -Ira Jackson, Dean, Peter F. Drucker and Masatoshi Ito Graduate School of Management

Hailed as the "Father of Modern Management," Peter F. Drucker stands out as one the most influential business and social thinkers of the 20th century. Drucker was a philosopher, historian, political economist, social ecologist, expert on Japanese art, and the author of 39 books. He inspired management thinkers, such as Tom Peters and Jim Collins; corporate movers and shakers, such as Jack Welch and Andrew Grove; and a whole generation of visionary leaders in the nonprofit sector. Yet, as those who knew him best knew, Drucker's greatest passion and pride was his role in the classroom.

William A. Cohen was the first graduate of the world's first executive Ph.D. program in management. That was in 1979 at Claremont Graduate School, known today as The Peter F. Drucker and Masatoshi Ito Graduate School of Management at Claremont Graduate University. Since then, he has achieved exceptional success as a leadership authority, speaker, author, and teacher. Over the years, he has continually relied on the insights and affirmed the revelations imparted by his teacher and friend, Peter Drucker. He now shares the engaging experience and life-changing benefits of learning from a true genius in A CLASS WITH DRUCKER: The Lost Lessons of the World's Greatest Management Teacher (AMACOM 2007).

"Much of Peter's oral wisdom from the classroom is both unique and important", Cohen writes. Drawing on his copious lecture notes, old papers, and a well-worn copy of Drucker's Management: Tasks, Responsibilities, Practices, he reconstructs the lectures that made the strongest impact when he was a student. "I have tried to come close to capturing Peter's actual words," Cohen assures, "but, in any case, I believe I have achieved the spirit of what he said and how he said it."

Resounding with Drucker's convictions, enthusiasm, and wit, A CLASS WITH DRUCKER imparts wisdom with practical applications, illustrated with wide-ranging examples from business, history, the military, and the author's own experience. Staying true to Drucker's method of teaching through intriguing anecdotes and encouraging spirited dialogue and debate, chapters present 17 key lessons from the Drucker curriculum. They include:

• If You Keep Doing What Worked in the Past, You're Going to Fail. To stay competitive, Drucker advised tomorrow's global business leaders to "obsolete" their past successes and create their own future.
• The Objective of Marketing Is to Make Selling Unnecessary. As Drucker made clear, selling and marketing can be adversarial. In his view, marketing-the process of first discovering and then delivering what customers want-is the basis of any business.
• Drucker's philosophy on the differences among Ethics, Honor, Integrity, and the Law, and dealing with cultural clashes in codes of conduct by striving to judge less while adhering to what works for everyone: do no harm.
• People Have No Limits, Even After Failure. Drucker refuted "The Peter Principle," the theory that people rise to their level of incompetence, as wrong and dangerous. He spoke out against firing a good person for doing a bad job.

Further lessons focus on accountability, management control, getting to know people in order to lead them, adapting strategy to suit the situation, and motivating the knowledge worker, among other topics. Culminating with Drucker's principles for self-development, A CLASS WITH DRUCKER is a vital contribution to Drucker's legacy.

WILLIAM A. COHEN, Ph.D., an internationally recognized authority on leadership, is the author of 53 books, including The Art of the Strategist, Secrets of Special Ops Leadership, and The Stuff of Heroes. President of his own leadership training and consulting firm, the Institute of Leader Arts, he gives speeches and seminars for wide-ranging corporations, as well as for the FBI Academy, the Industrial College of the Armed Forces, and all four branches of the United States Military. He lives in Pasadena, California.

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